In the printing industry, there exist well-defined printing processes which are specifically known as flexography and rotogravure. These processes typically use liquid inks and coatings which differ from paste-type off-set printing ink in ways which create special problems. More specifically, these liquid inks are known to be fast drying and, when the ink is dried on the press parts, are most difficult to clean.
In recent years, this problem has become even more pronounced. The reason for the encountered difficulties lies in the trend toward the use of water-based inks. As is known, water-based inks are not resolvable and are almost impossible to remove once dried.
Despite this fact, it is critical to be able to remove these inks from the press parts for a singularly important reason. In particular, the expense of equipment utilized in the printing industry, and the quality nature of the printing process, makes it essential to be able to remove ink from the press parts that are used to transfer ink to the printing plate, i.e., anilox rolls and rubber rolls, and the printing cylinder, i.e., gravure cylinder. For this reason, Graymills Corporation has developed a proprietary chemical solution specifically designed for removing water-based inks.
While this represents a significant advancement in the field, there is still a great deal of difficulty involved in cleaning press parts. It has remained to provide an automated apparatus and method which can accomplish cleaning in a highly effective and efficient manner. For this purpose, the present invention is directed to overcoming the foregoing problems that have prevailed in the printing industry.